Nageswaraswamy gudi--Temples of M.T.M



Nageswaraswami temple holds a special place in my affections....For it was a favourite of my father,who was a siva bhakth,though , a nonconformist as long as ritualistic practices are concerned...He never was orthodox,...liked his cigarette and evening drink...never could be maneouvered to conduct even an ocassional satyanarayana vratham (to the sorrow of my mother)..rarely went to a temples, and that too, only when accompanying friends.... used to say, that as a judicial officer, the only duty required of him was to maintain honesty and not daily poojas........But he was a staunch believer in lord shiva..and Nageswaraswami gudi was one place, he visited albeit occassionally....Personally, i think, most siva bhakthas are like him...For , he seemed to be one lord who never seemed to differentiate between the DUSHTA and SISHTA... and how his followers worshipped him....

Also, i have a sneaking fondness for the Ammavaru,..One evening in a june,when i was eighteen.(dangerous age).. i went there,and stood before her, watching the lovely moorthi....and caught sight of her big Mangala sutrams....I still don"t know why i got the thought..but on that day, i just wondered when i was going to wear them myself....As i returned home with my aunts and cousins and went through the office chambers of my advocate grandfather,my uncle called and introduced me to someone who was sitting there...He was to be my brother-in-law, though i did not know it at that time.....And in two days, my husband came down to see me...ughf....well...well.....We were married in a kalyanamantapam nearby the same temple..and taken there as first thing...on my way to my marital home .... in turmeric washed clothes to make our bows ...

Nearly 250 years back, the place where the temple stood now was a wasteland , full of weeds, undergrowth, thorny bushes and anthills...A pious jamindaar called Kothi Ramachandra rao owned it and once,he thought of a plan to clean up the place and develop a garden.....An employee of his, called Bodapati Gurraju Panthulu was entrusted with the work... .....As he supervised over the process, panthulu noticed a large snake slithering into a big anthill and got the cleaning stopped for the day....When he got his men to dig up the anthill next day, he was surprised to see a sivalingam in it...He built a small pandal over it on his own expense and started offering daily poojas to the now installed lord....A sister of the jamindaar came forward to donate funds to construct a small size proper temple and the jamindaar himself dropped his plans to develop the garden and handed over the land to the lord...

It is a large temple, with a lofty towered gateway,, and extended grounds...A koneru is on the left side of the grounds...when we were kids, we specially liked it and in a way went there only for the joy of a dip in it...The sivalingam is a middling large one...Ammavaru,stands in an alcove,to the right of the corridor in front of the sanctum..Mandatory to the shiva temples, a veerabhadra stands in a side temple with bright, large silver eyes..Ganesh and subrahmanya too are in attendance with their consorts...

A navagraha mantapam and lord ram"s temple are also built at the side of the main temple...

The temple is usually a well attended one,,and almost all days bhajans, purana kalakshepams, harikathas go on in the premises...It could almost be called as the spiritual hub of the bandar"s devout.....

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